Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

oth races, is now fifth 'with 249.5 points after scoring seventh- and nin th-place i nishes. RACE ONE With the Honda s performi ng very e ll durin g pra ct ic e , Corser ha d no hoice othe r tha n to charge to the front md try to stay there. A t first blu sh, th e I,an worked ou t all right, bu t for o nly I ', laps, at which time he was dropped to seco nd b y Fo ga rty. Pol e qu alifi er li ght was, ho w ever, a lre a dy p u tting tremendous pres sure on th e two red bikes . By the fourth lap Slig ht had worked his way past Corser - the beginning of a downward spiral for the Australia n and an u pwar d one for the New Zea lander and sta rted to threat en Fogarty' s lead . The ever-te nac ious Brit stayed up front for 11 laps, bu t the seemingly inev itable finally happened and Slight wen t to the fron t an d left th e factory Duca tis be hind . Corser, me anwhi le,' had started losing ground, while Chili was d oin g just th e opposite, climbing hi s was u p thro ug h the field. Their paths naturally crossed , and Ch ili too k over th ird from the number-11 bike at th e hal fway stage. At the fro nt of th e field, Slight and Fogarty had opened up a gap, with Chili and Co rser forming a second pair, and w ith A ki ra Ya n a ga w a a nd W hi tha m fina lly ge tting in fron t of Edwards, who had been running fifth . For Co rse r, it seemed, the o nly way to go w a s d o wn : 10 lap s b e fore th e ch eck e red flag, he los t ano the r tw o places to the Kawasaki and the Suzuki, bu t he wo uld succeed in keeping Ed wards at bay. During the final laps, Slight man aged to offer himself a small bu t comfortableeno ug h lead over Foga rty, who then lost second to Chili on the fina l lap. Ya na ga w a fi nis hed fo u rt h a n d Wh it ham finished fift h, with Corser a disappointed sixth. " I ha d a good start for a cha nge," Sligh t said. "After th at I sat behind CarL He had the ed ge on me ou t on the slow co rners bu t I co u ld catch him on the b rakes . When I got the mt'ssagt' that Chili was 'p u tt ing in some fast laps, I d e cid ed to tak e th e lead and h o p e I . cou ld m ake it s tic k . From then o n, everythi ng we nt really smooth. This track see ms to su it the bike as a glove. N ow it is up to me to wi n th e second race as well and try to nar row the ga p wi th Trov even more." Wit h Corser way back in sixt h, Chili and Fogarty also had evt'ry reason to be happy wi th their result. "I had ano ther ba d start," the Italian complained . "I tried to come back in the firs t few laps, but everybody see me d to be reallv hot at that mom ent. So I wait ed a little bit, tried to save my tire for some six laps and the n had another go . Thi ngs we nt well, and I go t past Wh itham and Ed wards without too ma ny problems. At the end of the race, my tire was still doing we ll, an d that allowed me to take second pl ace fro m Carl in th e closing kilometers." Fogarty was of co u rse a bit d isappointed t o have had an extra four poi nts sna tched away by his Italian colleague, but he was sti ll pleased to have done as well as he did . "I felt pretty co nfident," Foga rty said. "But after 10 la p s , the tire went. I th o u gh t I could s tay with Aaron, but then we ran into so me backm ark ers, O n to p of th at , th e sus pension was set u p far too soft, with the ti re goi ng bad . Frankie ha d used the same tire but a differ e nt s us pe nsio n s e t t in g , a nd t hat wo rked ou t a lot bet ter . At the 'end, the bike was bu cking an d weaving everywhere . I could n' t go any fas ter than I did. I lost my last chance to keep second position when I br ak ed a bit too hard on th e las t lap and los t too much grou nd ." In the seco nd half of the race, Yanagawa had m anaged to get away from Whitham, and he spe nt the rest of th e race a ll alo ne. W h itham and Co rser crossed the line next, though se pa ra ted by so me dis tance. "The engi ne lost power for some reaso n o r a nothe r," the Australian said . Slight fast, start to finish T he Honda RC45 once again looked good right from the word "go" on Friday morning, with Aaron Slight posting the best time on the first day of qualifying and then doing it all over again d urssionand the Superpole lap. ing the second qualifying se "I was really nervous before going out but I calmed down on the warmup LlP:' the New Zealander SOlid after having recorded his second pole position of the year. "I didn't want to do what 1did in Germany earlier this year and go from being fastest in qualifying to ninth place on the grid. We didn't have to change a lot on the bike since Friday morning. I spent most of the time today trying different tire . The work s we have done during private testing on the Brno track earlier this week proved to be very precious. Especially the progress we made with the Brembo brakes has been impressive. TI,e brake have bee n so me so rt of s a problem since the beginning of the season, but now they seem to ,vork perfectly - even on this track, which must be the hardest track on brakes in the whnle season." Slight's pole position might not have been too much of a surprise, but that didn't appl y to the other three men on the front row. I 0 one expected Akira Yanagawa to perform this well after his horrific Laguna Seca crash, bu t ther e he was, seco nd on th e gri d . The Kawasaki rider had m issed Brands Hatch, as well as a private practice sess ion at Assert, and had only done a few laps dur ing the Brno private practice, so he was naturally very pleased with his qualifying position. . "I am happy with my best Superpole performance of the year." said Yanagawa, who won his first Wo rld Superbike race at this circuit last season. "I worried about my collarboneand my left hand, but I am feel- ing stronger each time I go out on the Kawasaki. I have tested mvself over m,my laps during qualifying and I am sure that I will not be u;'de r any physical disadvantage over race distance. Thanks to telemetry, we were able to compare my times with the lap record I set last year. This gave me the advantage of knowing where I could improve and enabled me to se t an eve n faster time today." "Th ere's nothing I could do about it. I su ppose I should be happy to have finish ed the race at a ll." Edwards got home seven th after a racelong battle with Kawasaki's Nei l Hodgson. "In the ea rly stages, I thou ghtI could catch Aaron comfortably, but then tire trouble held me back," the Texan ex p lained . "The rear w a s o u t of line everywhe re so [ had to close th e throttle before changing gea r." Pete r Goddard finis hed 10th . "I picked a d ifferent tire to James and it gave o u t ve ry ea r ly o n," the Aus tralian said. "I'll be cha ngi ng it for race two." Yamaha rid er s Noriyu ki Haga a nd Scott Ru ssell weren ' t a ble to recover fro m their third-row starti ng pla ces and James Whitham was the second surprise on the front row, seUing the third-fastest time after having qualified a fair eighth in the regular sess ion. "That was as near a perfect lap as I can imagine," a delighted Whitham said. "We saved our Dunlop qualifier until the Superp ole warmup and it proved to be exactly the right tactic. I was able to go much hard er into the turns and it was Iiterallv as smooth as silk. Tomorrow ,,;11, however, be hard; the Suzuki is stilI very good on top speed but lacks acceleration power out of the corners compared to the Honda and the Ducati." Superpole specialist Troy Corser had to settle for fourth this time. "TIle tires did n' t work quite as well as on the other circuits," the Australian explained, "I didn't want to risk crashing, either. I've won enough watches this year for taking pole position. Basically, we've been struggling to get the bike working exactly as I wanted. The changing temperatures didn't really help, either, as to the setup of the injection system and the tire choice. Finally, I seem to be 7 kph down on the fastest guys on the straight, and it's very difficult to try to win that ground back in the corners." . Pier-Francesco Chili and Carl Fogarty led off the second row and were joined there by Neil Hodgson and Peter Goddard. "I am very happy," Goddard SOlid with a smile. "Like all really good laps, it was uneventful, and considering I have never clapped eyes on the place until this week, I feel very pleased with a second-row start." Colin Edwards II was ninth on the grid, with Andreas Meklau (with an official '98 engine in his Ducati) right on his tail. "We did everything right," the Texan said. "But I couldn' t get the bike steering into the comer. And I waoted to stay on my two wheels. I seem to Iike the track, eve n though I've never been here before. We'll see what happe ns tomorrow:' The two Yamaha factory riders were even worse off, with Scott Russell 11th and Noriyuki Haga 12th. "You have got one lap to get it all right. so it is tough, but we know this," Russell said. "I was hoping to get into the 1:30range, but I didn't manage it. I knew this was going to be one of our worst tracks and I've just got to get some good starts tomorrow. They're going to be long races for us, with only a few oppor- . tunities to pass people." Russell had been struggling with gearing problems and a lack of top speed for most of the weekend. Italian Pier-Francesco Chili (7) reels in James Whitham (8), Neil Hodgson (5) and Akira Yanagawa (4) in the first race. Chili lought his way to second, then took th ird in race two. had to se ttle for ninth and 12th, respective ly. "I go t off the line well but I got into trouble in on e of the first corners w he n som ebo dy m es sed it up ne xt to m e," Russell said. "I wasn't happy with th e tire cho ice and after wher e I ended up after th e first lap, it was really di fficu lt to mak e a ny p rogress. I can 't ge t no thing going with th e b ike here. I co u ld . push w it h th e fro n t, b u t every tim e I o pened th e thro ttl e I was go ing sideways. I also th ought I was goi ng to di e br eath ing up (G regorio) Lavi lla's ex haust th e w ho le time. I d on 't kno w w ha t th ey put in tha t bike but it is no good when yo u are rig ht behind it." RACE TWO The ra ce got und er way af ter a half hour d el a y following a m assi ve sta rtli n e cra s h in th e Sup ers port W orld Series ra ce (see " Briefly ... "). a n d th e 35,000 spec tators saw non e o ther tha n Suzu ki-mou n ted Whitham jump in to the lead w hen the lights turned g reen. Whitham held th e spot for a time, bu t Slight too k over the poin t o nce again. Whitham, joined by teammate Goddard , hung on behind, wi th th e Kawasaki of Yanagawa and the three Ducati s all givingchase. God dard was the first one to d rop off the pace of the lead g roup, w hile Corse r appeared to really be in a groove. Th e Aus tra lia n worked past Whit ha m and then took over the lead on lap six, se tting u p a tremendous show at the front. wi th Sligh t, Fogarty, Ya nagawa a nd Chil i all ba ttli ng for the lead . Th e top five's pace during the first half of the race left th e battle for sixth between Whit ha m, Edwards and Goddard well behind. Slight managed to get back in the lead while Corser was once again slowing d o wn . Fog arty came by the A us tra lia n and, with seven laps left in the race, Fogarty go t past Slight and tried to make a break, but to no avail. With just five laps left, the same three 13

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